He was the third son of Joseph & Polly Benson Bartholomew He was born on 5 November 1851 in Kanesville, Iowa and came with the family to Utah where they settled in Springville. After about 9 years, Joseph, along with four others felt it wasn't safe in Springville anymore so they packed up and moved south. They found a place that pleased Polly in Warm springs (later Fayette) and settled into building a new life for themselves.

George Marston had a very busy childhood; the following are excerpts from a compilation of his journal:

Note: much of what has been written was interpreted from his journal and expounded upon by one of his biographers.

At that time clothing was hard to get. My shirts and pants were made of canvas from a worn out wagon cover, and later made from "linsey", a heavy all wool, home spun fabric which mother wove on her loom. Socks and mittens were knitted from home spun yarn. I had no hat. Shoes were the hardest article of clothing to get. I was a big teenage boy before I had any, except in the coldest weather. We tried buckskin moccasins, but they were not very good. I had a pair of buckskin trousers and on one occasion I went hunting with them on. The snow was quite deep, and the pants were soon wet to my waist. They kept getting longer and longer and so I turned them up and rolled them up at the bottom. When I got home, I hung them up to dry by the fireplace. The next day, when I tried to put them on, they had shrunk so small and were so hard, that I could not get into them.

Welly Wood, one of the boys about my age, Was presented with a new pair of buckskin breeches; and he was showing them off to the boys on a hunt in the hills after deer. A fresh snow left the brush well saturated, and it didn't take long to get the new breeches

Wet. We11 they began getting under his heels and picking up a lot of mud. So he used his knife on the legs, cutting enough off the bottoms so that they were about ankle length. But

In another hour, he had to take another six inches off the legs to bring the bottoms back to shoe top length. As the day progressed, and it got warmer. The snow and dampness disappeared from the brush and cedars the pants began to dry. As they dried, they shrank shorter and tighter on his legs. By the time we got back home he was a comical-1ooking sight with tight buckskins that reached just to his knees, and so hard that he had to soak them again to get them off.

Hell's Kitchen

Dad Mellor and Pap Roper went up Mellor's Canyon in 1862 looking for cottonwood saplings so that they could plant them as shade trees. It was the latter part of May. They looked in the Hells Kitchen areas but they never got to Timber Canyon where they originally intended on going. Dad Mellor had his big butcher knife and Pap had a 22 caliber rifle and a small dog. They did not have any luck finding tree shoots; but as night approached, a thunder storm arose. After talking it over they decided to head west and get off the mountain that way. Night came on, and not being able to see very far ahead, they would throw a rock and listen to it to hear what was ahead. Occasionally, when the lightning flashed, they could also see a little way ahead. They encountered a lot of difficulty getting off the ledges, and Dad Mellor kept repeating, "Ells Kitchen, Ells kitchen." It was about morning when they showed up at Warm creek. When asked where they had been the always answered "Ells kitchen".

Hunting Ducks

I used to hunt rabbits on the north bench toward the mouth of ax handle, and I would run to keep my bare feet warm. Even if there was a little snow on the ground. The year after we settled here, Willie (William Orange, George's brother) was given a new gun--a muzzle loading rifle. I also had a similar gun all my own.

Early one morning Willie and I crawled onto some ducks south of the house. They were not very wild, so we were able to get quite close. We waited until we both had two ducks in line and fired. I got two and ran home with them to my folks. Willie picked up his two mallards and also ran home with them. After the excitement was over, they said, "Willie, where is your gun?" "I dunno," said Willie, so they went back to look for it. They found it where he had dropped it in the mud when he run to get the ducks.

Feather Bed

Mother Always saved the duck feathers and soon had enough to make a feather bed to sleep on and also a feather tick to have over the bed when the weather was cold. I slept on the floor on a bed of bulrushes with a sheepskin under me until we were able to get more bedding.

Trout

Willie and I were each given a fish hook and a heavy line. So we went fishing down at the mouth of warm creek where it emptied into the Sevier River. We baited our hooks and tied the lines to willows. The next morning we each had a big trout. We would go down to our fish lines before breakfast.

Bear

When we were not working our oxen, we let them graze out on the north bench. When we needed them, we oftimes had to hunt for them for quite awhile. One day the boys came rushing home with the report that a bear had killed one of the oxen and was eating it out north of the bend in the river. This was the real thing, so we hitched up a yoke of oxen to a wagon, and about a dozen of the best shots in town took off for the bend in the river. When we got to the place, they left the wagon and circled the place where the ox had been killed. There was old mister Grizzly bear among the big bullberry bushes and grease woods.

As the boys closed in on the spot from all directions, the old bear raised up on his hind feet and haunches and looked around as he aroused from his sleep. Everyone fired at him. He started to run, but before the guns were reloaded, the bear stopped and fell over dead.

Then they brought the wagon down but the oxen were determined not to go close to the bear. They had to lead and push the team until they got the wagon along side of the bear. He was so heavy and huge that we could not load him on the wagon. Then someone suggested that they dig a hole for one of the wheels. We dug the hole and let the wheel into it. Then altogether rolled the bear onto the wagon and took him to town. He must have weighed a thousand pounds or more. The fat was used to make soap and the meat was divided among the folks in town to eat. That was the largest bear that I ever saw.

To make soap out of the bear fat, our folks would burn large heaps of shadescale brush and put the ashes in a crock jar or barrel and pour water over them. As the water filtered out through the hole in the bottom of the barrel, it was caught and that was used as lye. The grease or fat was then boiled in this water until the mass became soft soap.

Warm Creek Spring

Arrowpine was the chief of the Indians who claimed this valley, and they also claimed ownership to the spring. Once he with some of his tribe were camped up by the spring. They could not find any deer and were hungry and sullen. John E. Metcalf was using the spring water to run the gristmill up near the spring. So he gave those men two oxen for the privilege of using the water.

The Indians blamed the pioneers for making them hungry. They said that the white man took their game and made deer scarce. Later my father gave Jake Arrowpine two oxen for the spring water with which to irrigate. So in that way, Warm Creek and the spring were bought from the Indians. But the tribe always camped up on the sand hills by the spring whenever they traveled through or hunted here.

Indian War

In 1865 the Indians attacked and killed one man near Mayfield and two men were killed and scalped near Salina. As a result every man and boy available volunteered as minutemen or militia and were mustered into service. I served in Captain Christian Tollestrup's company from May 1 to November 1 1867. My Father was the constable in Warm Creek so word was brought to him. The folks all moved from Warm Creek to the fort at Gunnison. Father and his boys camped here at Warm Creek to care for the cattle and horses.

Return to Warm Creek

We were glad when peace was restored and our folks moved back to our warm creek home. Our farm was west and north of our home and we raised wheat, oats and potatoes. At first we used oxen with which we plowed, Harrowed, and furrowed. But later we got some horses.

Church house built

When the meeting house was being built, my brothers and I went into Twelve Mile Canyon for timber and lumber for the joists and rafters and the sheeting on the roof. We had made a road into the west end of black hole to a place we named Bartholomew Hole. Where there was a nice grove of Red pine timber.

On October 24 1873 my brother William was with us he was taking his gun off the wagon, and it accidentally discharged, killing him instantly. So we had that heart breaking news to break to our parents as we arrived home with his lifeless body.

We made the first roads into twelve mile canyon. The vegetation was so dense that animals had to lunge into it to get through.

At the time when silver was discovered at Pioche, Nevada, I hauled Freight out there and hauled bullion back to the railroad terminal at York, now known as star ranch in Juab county.

Driving Steers to Salt Lake

I once drove a herd of steers to salt lake to sell. I had a good saddle horse and spent several days trailing them down there. While I was delivering them, I noticed a suspicious looking fellow standing around watching me. He just happened to be around to find out which way I had come. And he saw that I was paid in Gold coin. I had hidden the gold coin and after supper, about time to go to bed, I pretended that I was going to see that my horse was fed and all right before retiring to my room. I slipped the saddle on my horse and took off to the west toward the south end of the Great Salt Lake. After covering a good distance, I turned squarely to the left and south across the high bench at the present site of Kearns and stayed high, away from all the roads even at the point of the mountain. I knew the country fairly well and made good time in the darkness.

This occurred during the time of many stage hold ups when the country was full of many shady characters and road agents. I had my coin in a pouch and securely tied and concealed under the pommel of my saddle. I had succeeded in giving this fellow the slip after he had trailed me around more than half a day. I kept to the open country west of Utah Lake and put a great many miles behind me before I stopped and let the horse rest and eat some grass.

Marriage of John and Eliza

My Brother John Bartholomew, and Eliza Metcalf decided to get married. In those days before any temples were completed, marriages were performed in the endowment house at Salt Lake. So Acting as the big brother, I took the lovers to salt lake, making the trip down there in three days. It was all right being the chaperone, and to see them safely there, but I did not care much for being the extra company on the return trip. I had planned for that and had taken my saddle horse along as a third horse. So when time commenced to get a little heavy, just out of salt lake, I turned the lines over to John, saddled my horse and arrived home long before they did.

Cooing and wooing

Did you ever here the proverb, "The one I want I can't have, and the one that wants me the devil wouldn't have?" Maybe it wasn't that serious, but the one I liked wasn't old enough, But a certain young lady (and her mother) decided that she was the one (the one the devil wouldn't have) and only one for me. She always happened along just at the right time so that I had to be her escort. This time it was a horseback ride to Gunnison. I was going, and she just had to go for a reason all her own. So I saddled another horse and we left for points south. When we were about half way there, her cinch was very loose, So I let her off her horse so I could cinch up the saddle a little tighter. Then I immediately got into my saddle and left her there with out the horse. I think that was the straw that broke the camels back or something!

I was about 25 or 26 when I began to feel serious about a home of my own. My brothers except for James who was an invalid, and all my sisters were married. I had always liked Pap Roper's daughter, Selena, and the family too. Selena was ten years younger than I. But it wasn't hard to wait. I saw her quite a bit as she worked and lived quite bit of the time with her aunts here in Warm Creek. She also lived with and worked for the Metcalfs.

Later Pap Roper moved to Castle Valley to Huntington and Lawrence with his family. It just seemed like the sun set in the east and didn't shine here any more. But rather shone warmer and brighter over the mountain.

Mission Call

I received a call to go to the southern states on a mission during the fall of 1880. I went and labored in Tennessee. On December 1, 1882 I arrived home from my mission to see my mother, father, brothers and sisters--yes and to see my love-stone.

Making plans

I set about to get things in readiness to get married. I filed on a 160-acre homestead east of Fayette town site. I hauled rock from the stone quarry. One evening in July, sometime before we were married, Selena and I, after previously having selected the site for the house, walked up on the bench to the site and looked at the beautiful stars. We set a stake where we planned on having the south east corner of the house. Then by lining it up with the North Star, I placed a stake where we would have the northeast corner. And from these two stakes we measured the foundation.

I had Neils Tollstrup of Gunnison build the house. While hauling rock for our home, I also hauled rock for and supervised the building of a home for my sister Lizzie and her husband William Bown. (Who was on a mission to the northern states at the time) on 20-acre piece of my homestead, which I gave them for the right to use the Metcalf mill ditch. Which I enlarged and extended to my land.

Married

In Late October, having gotten everything in readiness, We went to Salt Lake and were married in the Salt Lake endowment house, November 1, 1883, with Daniel H. Wells officiating. So aside from my invalid brother James, I was the last of our family to marry and leave mother and father and make a home for my family. As a wedding present, Mother gave us a bedspread that she had made by hand, from wool that she had washed, corded, spun ahd woven. It was a prized possession as well as being very durable and serviceable. After our family was raised and about the time we moved into our new home in 1912, we gave the bedspread to Lloyd, hoping that he would see that it was preserved as an heirloom.

Buggy

Soon after setting up home building, I found that it was not practical for Selena to ride horseback or on a hard lumber wagon. So I bought a white top Studebaker buggy--a two seated, rugged outfit with curtains. It lasted about twenty five years, and then I bought another of the same type of buckboard or hack.

living

When we were first married, Selena Lived with her mother; six weeks later, we established housekeeping in the little log camp house on the corner of James Mellors lot December 18, 1883, While I rushed the construction of our home. It was late fall October 14 1884, before we were able to move into our house; By then we were blessed with our first born, a son who I named George M. and who was born August 29, 1884.

I worked Ditch, and having previously acquired title to 1/15 of the water of warm creek, I broke up land on our homestead and planted an orchard; Selena held the tree while I dug the hole, planted the tree, and refilled the hole with earth. I secured timber from the canyon and built a series of corrals, and accommodations for pigs, chickens, milk cows, calves, horses, and cattle. We built a huge fireplace in the west end of our big living room. I also hauled lots of pitch pine wood from the hills for fuel. It required about thirty to forty cord of wood to keep the frost line back. We had a cook stove for the kitchen, which was very modern for that time, as most people cooked over the fire in the fireplace. I had more land than I had water, so I gave some to william Bown, James Mellor, Joseph Bartholomew, and Henry Roper—brothers and brothers in laws.

As soon as William Bown returned from his mission, I went into partnership with him. We gathered our cattle together and took them to southern Utah and established a cattle business down there. It was several days trip there that took us past Salina, Willow bend, (Aurora) Black Knools, (Siguard) up Kings canyon to burrville, then over the divide to Rabbit Valley. Past Loa, Thurber, Teasdale, Grover, down over slickrock, and down the Golden stairs into stair canyon to the east side of Boulder mountain, into the country east and south.

The country was wild and new. There were no roads, and only a few trails, and much of the country had never been explored. We didn’t have access to any high mountain range for the cattle in the summer, so they just ranged over the hills and ravines wherever they could find grass and water, in the washes, ravines or from seeps at the foot of clay hills or from cliffs or from tanks. When extremely dry weather dried up these sources of water, we had to round up the cattle and move them to fresh areas where they could find water to drink. During the winter and seasons of rain, there usually was water in the ravines and gulches and in the tanks in the sandstone areas. These tanks would fill with rain water and where the main sources of water for men and animals.

One time in early summer, we had to make camp before we could get to the seep or spring; so it was necessary to eat supper without water to drink. Along in the night our search became so intense that we could bear it no longer, so we lit out in the general direction of a seep we had seen once when we were on this route. It was so dark that we couldn’t see, so we just stumbled along for about two or three miles; when suddenly we came upon the seep. The water was warm, but it quenched the burning thirst, that awful burning of the bowels and dryness of the throat, mouth, and tongue.

Late in the fall of 1895, we had completed our fall gathering and had the cattle in the silver falls area where there was good feed, Buffalo grass, and other grasses. It had been a good year with lots of pinion plants. One of the boys went to Escalante for flour and supplies and brought the mail back. There was a letter for me from home and as I read it, I noticed that it was just a general newsletter and written on only one side of the paper, so after the others had gone to bed for the night I held the letter close to the fire pretending to be reading it. But the heat brought out the letter that was written with milk on the opposite side of the paper. Salena informed me that it was about time for me to be getting home. I didn’t get much sleep that night, as a voice seemed to say "Hurry, Hurry, Hurry home."

William Bown and the boys ribbed me that the letter had made me homesick, but I arranged with William to look after my cattle until I got back, as my folks needed me home. I rode until late in the night and then got out and on my way early in the morning. The mule traveled fast and made the trip in record time.

I had been home only a couple of weeks when Salena looked at me rather queerly along in the early afternoon and then said, "You’d better get some help". So I went for my sister lizzie, and she stayed with Salena while I went to Gunnison for the midwife, by team and buggy. That took over an hour and when I got back, Lloyd had arrived and was crying lustily.

It was late march when I went back down south. It took about five days to reach Notum, of Notown as we called it. I soon asked Will Bown how the cattle were getting along. "Well, (and spit a big spurt of tobacco juice) I haven’t seen them for quite awhile but I was just going to see tomorrow". Then after awhile, "the Indians were gathering pinion nuts and old Jake said Heap big winter coming, so I separated the cattle and left yours at the Moodys and trailed mine down Muley twist and out south of the Henry Mountains".

I inquired of the Bakers, the Amasa Lyman camp, and the Escalante Boys, But Couldn’t find anyone who had seen the cattle. I didn’t find any dead cattle or live ones either; but I picked up a rumor that someone had seen where some cattle had been trailed down to and across the Colorado River either at halls or at Dandy crossing.

I felt mighty low about having lost 300 head. I did find about a dozen yearling heifers with the Bown outfit south of the Henrys. I left them running with the Bown herd for a couple or three years and then brought them and my horses out and home.

While riding with cattle, I came upon a large colony of beaver about half way between Bakers and the Colorado River. A mister Bobsen and Haymaker had also told me that there were beaver down there. The beaver were in a box canyon on the Escalante River. There were lots of trees, willows, etc. I took what traps I had the next trip down from Fayette and that winter, I tried to catch them but I didn’t have much success, partly because of the quick sands in the water and partly because the beaver were the largest that I had ever come across in my trapping experience. This colony had never been trapped, although it was rumored that Jim Bridger and others had made unsuccessful attempts at it. So it was a virgin field.

Later I bought some new traps, a body type, but they didn’t catch anything either. The next summer, I had Carl Swalsburg of Gunnison take my traps apart and we put one spring inside the other, making a double spring at either end of the trap. The pan was set low and held by a special trigger. I used long chains so as to quickly drown the beaver. The traps worked well, and I spent three winters down in this solitary area catching over three hundred beaver. I would pack my traps in pack bags on three pack horses along with my other camp equipment which consisted of camp quilts, a light feather bed, a small pillow, a tent, a Dutch oven or bake kettle (about 10 inches), and a small Ballard rifle. For Grub I took a sack of flour, of which if I ran low I went into Escalante and got some more, salt bacon, a few pounds of rice, sugar, a little ginger, pepper, salt, a tin plate, knife, butcher knife, fork, spoon, bucket, sourdough jar (1 gallon size). I never used tea, coffee, or tobacco. With everything packed in I would take off sometimes riding my mule, and sometimes packing him and riding my horse. It usually took me six days to get there. I took several eight-foot boards along, and made a small boat or canoe as I needed it for trapping on the river.

Occasionally I would kill a deer, although they were not too plentiful. The last trip down, I shot a buck and a doe. I dressed the skins, cleaned off all the fat, soaked the skin in water, and removed the hair. Then I made a paste from the brains and a little water and worked and worked into the hide until it was all absorbed. I then stretched it out until it was dry and flint-like, like paper. This is the Indian method of tanning a buckskin. When I wished to use it, I moistened it again and worked it with a round stone until it was dry and soft like soft flannel.

One night as I lay in bed in a riverside cave or cavern, I thought I could hear water rippling louder than usual. I quickly arose; and there only a few steps down from my camp was water. I hurriedly made a fire and carried my camp and supplies to higher ground in the cave. It had been raining for several days, but it had increased and as soon as the sand could hold no more, it began pouring right into the river and all of it’s ten thousand rivulets and tributaries that flow into it. It was three days before the water went down to where I could tend my traps. Some had beaver in them. I never lost a trap.

During the 1880’s and 1890’s, there were many outlaws, fugitives from justice, and renegade Indians hiding in the rough territory of southwest Colorado, Northern Arizona, and southeastern Utah; so I was always on the alert for signs of anyone that happen on or surprise me. Cattle and horse thieves with a price on their heads, a gun on their hips, and one on their saddles were hiding in this solitary wilderness.

Something began saying to me, "get out of here". The Loneliness became so intense that I gathered my traps, hid my boat, packed my camp and beaver pelts, and set out for home. I felt the urge to move and did so as fast as I could. I got up to Escalante when the wind began blowing, and it soon set to snowing. I packed up the next morning and made my way to Bakers at boulder; everything was white and the going was tough and dangerous, especially over the black stairway out of Death Hollow.

It snowed some more. I took off early the next morning, and the 32 miles to the Dirty Devil were so long that I thought I would never get there. My feet dragged in the snow; sometimes I could see the blazes on the trees, and sometimes I was completely lost and couldn’t see any signs of the trail; so I just put the reins over the saddle horn and let the mule pick his way, and the pack horses followed behind. Night came on long before I reached the Slickrock or the Dirty Devil. I just let Jack use his head and trusted that he could find the narrow trail and carry me safely around the mountain and over the fields of Grover. It must have 9 or 10 o’clock at night when we came out of the trees and boulders, down Carcass Creek, and out to the Dirty Devil River. There I stopped and made camp, wet, cold, hungry, and exhausted; the horses were so tired they could hardly walk with the heavy packs on their backs. I finally got a fire made and unpacked the horses where I had moved the snow off as best I could with my feet. The horses couldn’t get much grass, as the snow was too deep. The next morning they looked pretty gaunt and tough, as well as being so tired they looked as if they would fall over.

I packed the horses up but hadn’t gone very far before I saw that I would have to lighten the load or I’d never make it over Rabbit valley Mountain, or ever get away from where I was. I searched out a place where I could hide my beaver traps, placed them under a shelf rock, and piled rock in front of them to hide them from any inquiring eyes that might happen along that way. They are still there, as far as I know. I finally made it to George Brinkerhoffs at Thurber and fed my horses and rested again.

The next day I was out early, and with much urging I was able to get across the rabbit valley divide by night. The road hadn’t been broken yet, so I just had to let the horses wallow and flounder through the snow that was three feet deep over the high divide. I finally reached Hen Knights at Burrville, with my light load consisting of about a hundred beaver pelts, small tent and bedding, Grub box, and a couple of deer skins.

The next Day I went down lost creek to Salina, and was sure glad to get to where the snow was not up to the horses belly or knees. I followed the West Side of the Sevier River from there to Fayette, and was never more happy to get home.

When I reached home, everybody was excited over the news that had just reached Utah that Admiral Dewey had captured the Philippines. Someone in Fayette had just received a newspaper with red headlines and pictures with the account of the victory. So while I rested a day or two I read all the news.

Later in the winter, I took the cured pelts to salt lake and sold them to stenzel for $5.00 a pelt. I had finally made about $1500.00 out of beaver pelts, which I was going to use to buy land and set up a cattle business of my own again here in Fayette.

I bought the Grundvig place (160 acres) the Agust Anderson place (160 acres) and finally the Johnson place (160 acres) making a block of land for cattle pasture west of town mostly west of the Sevier River.

In 1907, he commenced work on the new house made from brick where he and Salena lived until their death. George was very proud of his family’s church service and he served as one of the member of the Manti Temple corporatio, (A group of Trustees that took possesion of the Temple in order to keep it out of the hands of the US Government after the Edmonds/Tucker bill was signed and the federal government was seizing church property everywhere.) He stands as a great example to all his posterity of many things but the greatest example of all, is the tenacity and boldness it took to make something of very little and to keep going. Even though people knocked him down, he got back up and kept going. He built a legacy for his family from scratch. From his own hard work and resourcefulness. And he stands as one of the heroes of the American west. He was a rancher, a cowboy, and mountain man. But even in that role he had learned to listen to his Father in Heaven, that made him different.